Turners Falls Debate Mirrors ’90s Frontier Mascot Change

What started as a complaint to a school board about the local high school’s mascot turned into a contentious issue within town and spurred a large open forum, an outcry from alumni and the public and continued for months.

It’s easy to assume the situation described above is the current “Indian” mascot debate in Turners Falls, but it also describes what happened nearly 20 years ago when another local school district decided to engage in a public discussion about its Native American mascot, which led to the Frontier Regional School changing its mascot from the “Redskins” to the “Red Hawks.”

Times have changed, but the two debates, one ongoing and one resulting in a change, are so similar it begs the question: Is local history repeating itself?